1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an imaging apparatus and method, an electronic device, and a program, and specifically relates to an imaging apparatus and method, an electronic device, and a program, whereby noise due to a defective pixel outputting a peculiar-level signal at random depending on the properties of individual transistors to be used at a CMOS (Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor) solid-state imaging device made up of a semiconductor can be reduced.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the event of fixed-patterned noise which outputs a signal having a constant level, noise output for each pixel from an imaged image is reduced, whereby the image can be corrected. However, with a defect wherein a peculiar-level signal is output at random such as random noise, when performing subtraction of a particular value that is a method for correcting fixed-patterned noise, this causes a problem in the case where no random noise has occurred that the image is excessively corrected.
Also, a method has been proposed wherein pixel values within a particular region are compared within the region, a pixel having a peculiar output level is determined to be noise, and is subjected to smoothing, thereby reducing the noise (see Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2007-143120).
Also, separately from smoothing, a method for creating a simple background image with shooting in succession has been proposed (see Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2003-230045), and as a secondary effect thereof, removal of random noise from a background image can be conceived to be enabled. Specifically, this is a method for making up a histogram from the pixel values of successive shots, and simply creating a background by employing the most frequent value for each pixel of a background image.